After a year of University online its finally time to return back to campus. But first here’s my experience travelling to Melbourne via the Vaccinated Travel Lane
Note: This is based on my experience and may not reflect what occurs during your trip. Quarantine/isolation and testing requirements do change based on the COVID situation and it is advised that you check the Victorian Government website for the latest updates before your flight.
In order to utilize the VTL there were several documents which needed to be prepared. I recommended that you print these documents out.
When checking in our luggage at Changi Aiport we were asked to show physical proof of our vaccine certificate and the negative pre-departure PCR test. Afterwards everything during the transit to Melbourne occured as per usual.
Within 24 hours of arrival we were required to either take a PCR or take a RAT (Rapid Antigen Test) test and isolate until we returned a negative result.
Another PCR/RAT test was required to be taken between days 5 and 7 of arrival.
Again these were the quarantine arrangements during my trip (02/01/2022) and might not be up to date. Do check the Victorian Government website for up to date information before your flight.
Currently RAT kits are sold out in all chemists and pharmacists in Melbourne. I would highly recommend bringing your own kits from Singapore in order to avoid the hassle.
While PCR tests in Melbourne are free the current surge of omicron has resulted in large waves of people lining outside testing sites waiting to get tested. It takes 3-4 hours of waiting in line before even setting foot inside the testing center.
If you are required to take a PCR Test my suggestion would be to queue up at your nearest testing site before open hours.
Update 07/02/2022: Ever since Victoria has shifted to more Rapid Antigen Testing the lines for PCR tests have dissapeared, meaning it is now possible to walk in for a PCR test without needing to queue for hours.
The last thing that needs to be done after arriving is setting up the Service Victoria App.
Melbourne’s TraceTogether App. It allows you to check in at stores and acts as proof of your vaccination status. In order to set it up you need to have your vaccine certificate uploaded.
As international students we don’t have access to Medicare so we had to upload our COVID-19 certificates using the Individual Healthcare Identifier (IHI).
The quickest way to get an IHI is online through your myGov account. If you don’t have an account, it’s easy to create one.
After creating your myGov account follow these steps to get an IHI online:
After getting our IHI we needed to find a pharmacist/chemist/GP who was able to upload our Vaccination Certificates onto the IHI.
Any place which does vaccinations should be able to upload the certificates. For us we chose to go to the Chemist Warehouse on Elizabeth Street where we paid a $10 service fee for the upload.
We were required to present:
After the certificates were uploaded we were then able to add our digital certificates to the Service Victoria App.
Log onto your myGov account using a browser on your phone
Select the ‘Individual Healthcare Identifiers’ service
Select ‘View immunisation history’ on the ‘Immunisation history’ tile.
Tap ‘Share with check-in app’.
Tap ‘Service Victoria’
Check out the full steps here
After uploading the vaccine certificates our vaccination status would now be shown whenever we checked into a venue. We were finally be able to leave our passports and physical vaccine certificates at home :)